


Antonia Sharpe

by Deshima



Category: Sharpe (TV), Sharpe - All Media Types, Sharpe Series - Bernard Cornwell
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Implied Child Abuse, Not Beta Read, alternative universe, implied child neglect
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-08
Updated: 2016-03-08
Packaged: 2018-05-25 14:43:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6199069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deshima/pseuds/Deshima
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Antonia's mother is dead but she also has a father and Richard Sharpe always had trouble letting go what's his.</p><p>Or what happens when Richard Sharpe raises his daughter</p>
            </blockquote>





	Antonia Sharpe

**Author's Note:**

> I always thought it weird that RIchard Sharpe who seemed to love Antonia so much even when he had barely seen her would essentially abandon her to her uncle after Teresa's death. So here he did keep contact. During Sharpe's Company we see that Teresa's family is not entirely happy with her affair with Sharpe. I translated this into later child neglect which for Sharpe is enough reason to claim her back. So now we suddenly we have a Sharpe who is not only a soldier but also a dad which leads to him making some decisions differently. Mostly his decision to marry Jane Gibbons, since I really hated that character. I mostly followed the tv-series since I have seen all of those and haven't read all the books ( yet). It has been a while though so the timeline is probably all over the place and not accurate at all.

After Teresa’s death Richards falls into a depression so deep that Patrick at moments fears he will take one suicidal mission too many and not return. As such it takes him three months to remember that he also has a daughter who lost a mother. He sends a letter to Teresa’s brother asking about Antonia. The answer is curt.  
Antonia is well and is taken care of.  
Richard leaves it at that. He doesn’t have the faintest clue how to be a father and he figures that being Antonia Moreno, niece of a spanish lord is preferable to being Antonia Sharpe the daughter of a guttersnipe Major who jumped up from the ranks.  
He keeps writing letters though. Antonia is the last thing he has left of Teresa and he always had trouble letting go of what he considers his. And somewhere deep in his heart there is also this pipe dream that when the war is over he will have accumulated enough wealth and rank that he can come back for her. And so he spends evenings slaving over painstakenly written letters first in English and then in carefully worded Spanish that get mediculously picked over by Harris and occasionally major Hogan.  
The answers are always curt bordering on rude but Richard ignores it. He remembers Teresa saying that her family had been somewhat upset at her having a lowborn English lover and really, after seeing the savagery of the redcoats at Badajoz he can’t really blame them. As long as Antonia’s is well he doesn’t care.

Then almost eight months after Teresa’s death he recieves a letter not from Antonia’s uncle but from her cousin. Catharina Moreno is seven and her handwriting is still very shaky. Richard whose own literacy is on rather unsteady ground as well can’t make head or tails of it. He goes to Harris who after spending several years as a schoolteacher is an expert at deciphering childish chickenscratch. What the letter reveals leaves Richard ice cold. Antonia is being taken care of yes, but as the letter reveals only in the strictest sense of the word. She receives food, clothes and shelter but that is about it. Apparently Ramon Moreno doesn’t care much for the English bastard that has come to sully his family name and does his best to ignore his niece’s existence. Even at seven Catharina Moreno knows that it is not right and so she asks the man who writes such love -filled letters to her cousin to come and rescue her.

Richard barely takes the time to ask for leave before he takes some unlucky cavalryman’s horse and races back Badajoz in less than two weeks. Ramon is furious to see him but he quickly shuts up when Richard makes a move to pull his sword and he doesn’t object much when Richard asks for Antonia. The almost three year old waif is a far cry from the chubby eighth-month old baby Richard had last seen during the siege. What disturbs him most is how Antonia doesn’t hesitate to hug his legs. He may not know how to be a father but there are enough children running arount the camp for him to know that three-year olds do not spontaneously hug strangers. Even if those strangers are their fathers. It tells him enough about how Antonia has been treated. He doesn’t hesitate to pick her up and after asking and recieving Antonia’s meager possessions makes way for the horse. It’s probably smarter to spend the night in Badajoz but he wants to be as far away from the place as possible.

He hears the pitter-patter of childish feet behind him just after he manages to awkwardly climb on the horse with Antonia clinging to his neck like a monkey. He looks around to see a miniature Teresa shyly approaching him. For a moment he forgets to breathe. Antonia of course also looks like Teresa but she also has his eyes and her hair looks like it could become dark blond given the right amount of sun. This little girl looks like somebody turned back time. Distantly Richard realizes this must be Catharina, Antonia’s cousin. She says something and at first he doesn’t understands what she asks. After a moment she repeats her question and he realizes she is asking whether he’ll take good care of her cousin.  
“Sí,’he whispers. Catharina nods seriously. She then asks whether he’ll continue writing. She wants to know how her cousin is doing. Richard has to smile. Turns out Antonia had at least one protector in the Moreno household.  
‘Yo prometo,”he answers. Catharina smiles then and that finally breaks the resemblance. Teresa, no matter how happy, had never smiled with so little inhibition, not after what happened to her at the hands of the French. Richard hopes that unlike her aunt, Catharina will never lose that smile.  
With a last wave he starts the long journey back to the camp.

The first few weeks are hard for both of them. Antonia doesn’t speak a word of English yet, and Richard’s Spanish is not that good. The road is not the best place for a child especially not halfway through the winter and Richard has little idea of how to handle a three year old especially one who had despite everything still been used to three regular meals a day and a decent bed during the night. But Richard is nothing if not adaptable and turns out that Antonia has inherited that trait from him. By the time they finally reach the camp ( the way back had by necessity taken longer), Antonia is saying her first words in English and she has grown utterly at ease with sleeping seated in front of him in the saddle.

The Rifles of course utterly adore Antonia just like they adore any other child born to the company. Richard may be her only family by blood but once she gets presented to the Chosen men she suddenly gains a whole slew of Uncles and a few Aunts as well. Ramona especially is determined to make Antonia the cousin of her own son and young Perkins though not quite of an age to be an uncle is more than happy to function as a sort of big brother.

With so many people to help, Antonia has little trouble settling into camp life and fate is kind enough to give her the time. It is winter still and though it means cold,sleet, snow and muddy roads it also means that the war has ground to a practical standstill for now. The only ones still doing work are the intelligence officers which means that Richard and his Chosen men do have to go out at time but not nearly as much as they would have to otherwhise. This leaves Richard with ample time to get to know the daughter that he had so far only learned from through letters and Teresa’s tales. His daughter he learns is (he has to chuckle at the pun) sharp as a knife and fiercely independent. Once she breaks out of her shell she is not afraid to voice her needs or opinions and she turns out to have a manipulative streak a mile wide. Angelic smiles, tear-filled pouts and thunderous scowls, all get used to reach whatever goals she has set herself and Richard has the devil of a time keeping her out of trouble. Not that he minds. He loves every minute he gets to spend in the company of his daughter and he is not even ashamed to admit she has him utterly wound around her dainty little pinky. It makes the rest of the Rifles chortle behind their hands but honestly they don’t have much of a leg to stand on since Antonia knows exactly how to hit their doting streak as well.

If winter was strangely idyllic the rest of the year seems to make an effort to be absolutely horrid. It starts with false accusations of murder and a fake hanging and the scream Antonia lets out when she sees what she thinks to be her father being hanged will always remain seared into Richard’s memory. He manages to clear his name in the end and Antonia does forgive him the deception after making him sweat for two weeks. But it makes him realize he cannot make foolhardy decisions anymore regarding both his love and his life. He has a responsibility to Antonia as well and though he has been carrying the responsibility of other lives for a while now none of them are this small and fragile and so utterly dependent of him. He knows that if he were ever to die the Chosen men would not hesitate to take responsibility for Antonia but it is something he would rather not burden them with. If anything Harris would have her reading the Marquis de Sade before she has reached the age of twelve and Patrick would have her swearing in irish before the year is out. It is probably still going to happen but Richard likes to think it will take slightly longer if he is present.

Fate however is not inclined to let him keep his new resolution.  
\---------------------------------------  
_Sharpe's Gold_

Richard thinks that if he hadn’t had Antonia he would probably have been attracted to Ellie Mugent. Now she only makes him think of his own daughter. Ellie is a dainty well-bred lady unlike Antonia who would probably already be swearing like the best of them if she could articulate the words ( she already has mastered hell and is working on bloody) but despite her upperclass upbringing Ellie has a certain courage that Richard already sees in Antonia as well. He has to wonder if he will ever inspire this kind of love in his daughter and he fervently hopes that if she ever feels the need to rescue him ( he prays to whomever listens she will never need to) that she will at least have more sense and preparation than Bess and Ellie Mugent. He decides to teach Antonia to fire a pistol as soon as her arms are strong enough at the very least.  
\-----------------------------------------

_Sharpe's Batt_ _le_

  
He might have acted rashly when he shot the two rapists in frond of Brigardier general Loup but he cannot find it in himself to regret it. There had been plenty of children in the village some of them of an age with Antonia and some of the raped girls were barely out of childhood. His mind is quick to replace their faces with that of his daughter and he thinks that the fathers of the village will not mind the revenge he took for them. It comes to bite him in the ass later however.

When he sees the fort he has to man he is happy he left Antonia at the main camp with Ramona. The fort is a ruin and gives very little shelter. She will probably give him the cold shoulder for a week when he returns but at least she is not going to catch her death. She already is at the age that she catches any sniffle that goes round the camp, no need to tempt fate. When Brigadier general Loup shows up with his company he is doubly happy. He was always glad that Antonia was too young to remember the siege of Badajoz and would not have wanted to have her go through this one either. He hopes she will much older when she suffers her first siege or preferably that the war ends before she has to suffer one at all. Also away at the main camp Antonia does not have to witness the death of her surrogate big brother. Patrick is devastated by Young Perkins’death and Richard has no doubt his daughter will be as well but at least she will not have nightmares unlike the ones Patrick denies having.  
\-------------------------------------------

_Sharpe's Sword_

Lass takes to Antonia like a fish to water. She seems to find braiding Antonia’s wild head of curls especially soothing and Antonia seems to understand instinctively that Lass needs that. Normally Richard’s little hellion will barely sit still for Ramona to put her shaggy mop in a quick pigtail but she lets Lass play with her hair for hours on end without too many complaints. Antonia may have inherited both her mother’s and father’s temper but she also inherited their soft hearts for fragile and broken things. Meanwhile Richard is busy trying to fulfill the mission he has been given. He is convinced that the french captain is actually the much sought after colonel Leroux but he has a devil of a time convincing the other officers. The colonel proving him right by breaking his parole and escaping towards the fort is only a meager consolation, as with the colonel now back on the french side it means the mysterious El Mirador is in even greater danger. He asks Harris for help as the former teacher is way more knowledgeable about codes than he will ever be and hope the code will be solved in time. Meanwhile he has other problems as Simmerson of all people is the british envoy and he wants to keep the man as far away from his daughter as he can manage. He asks Ramona to keep both Lass and Antonia busy at the other side of the camp which she does with amazing efficiency and discretion. Later he will be even more grateful for that since it means that Antonia doesn’t get to see her father being carried away from the battlefield more dead than alive.There are so many wounded that few notice when Richard gets carried to the cellar with the deadly wounded. For almost a full day he lays there and he half delirously despairs that the batty old sergeant in charge of the wounded will succeed in what so many have not. Killing Richard Sharpe. Then somebody bangs open the door of the cellars. He can hear Patrick as through a fog and then like a ray of sunshine his daughter’s shriek pierces through it.  
-I want my DADDY! Get him out NOW!  
After that he is still not out of the woods, but the thought of his daughter makes him hang on long enough to recover. By then Harris has broken the code and found their traitor and the cannon needed for the taking of the ford has arrived. He gives Spears a chance for honorable death. He does not know exactly who Leroux threatened to blackmail Spears but if that person was just as dear to Spears as Antonia is to him he sort of understands where Spears is coming from.

\-------------------------------

_Sharpe's Regiment_

The affair of the missing South Essex battalion is one big mess of cloak an dagger from start to end with some dashes of almost ridiculous romantic heroics thrown in. He would almost belive he is in some kind of roman if it wasn’t so deadly serious. He’s grateful he left Antonia in SPain with what is left of the Battalion. He shudders to think what would have happened if the assasins had gotten hold of her or worse if Simmerson had. This thought almost makes him propose to Jane Gibbons to get her out of Simmersons thumb. But then he remembers the promise he made himself almost a year ago. He’s had trouble to keep it what with the crazyness of the past year but right now he remembers. If he marries Jane Gibbons she will be Antonia’s mother. And while Jane Gibbons is a beautiful and sweet girl she is just that. Still a girl. And Antonia deserves a woman for a mother. And so he offers her only his protection. She almost pouts despite her situation as if this is indeed some damn fool romance novel. This seals the deal. Life and an especially war is not a story and if she expects it to be she would have been damn dissapointed with army life. He sets her up with some money and a small cottage and feels grateful when he can leave her in England and he goes back to Spain. His little hellion is waiting for him.

\------------------------------------------

_Sharpe's Siege_

The war goes well that year. Wellington manages to cross the Pyrenees before winter and with that obstacle gone the campaign continues despite the early frost. Richard and the Chosen men get send all over the southern part of France and sometimes it feels like he never gets to see his daugther. Antonia is still too young to understand and she resents the long absences. Richard does too even if he knows the importance of what he does. He starts resenting them even more when Antonia falls ill. It seems nothing at first. She is at the age she catches every sniffle and though she can be burning up at night she is often fine the next few days. But the fever nights keep coming and they take more out of her each time. His energetic little hellion is reverting to the little waif of a year before and there is very little he can do. In India he has seen comrades die of the relapsing fever or malaria as the better doctors call it. He has seen others like Colonel McCandles get better. He also knows that children sometimes get over diseases that will fell adults. He hopes Antonia is one of them but he figures that some time away from Gascony’s awful weather and some quinine would do her a world of good as well. Quinine is rare however and when he comes across some for one of their french “ allies” mother he is sorely tempted to seize it for Antonia. He doesn’t however and it turns out that good deeds do get repaid when the women’s daughter helps them after the untimely but not entirely unexpected betrayal. When he comes back to camp many days later it is to find Antonia on the mend and nearly back to her usual mischief. Turns out the the Chosen men are not the only ones with a soft spot for his little hellion. Wellington proved he does have a heart under his steely mask and went to great lengths to provide quinine for Antonia.

\--------------------------------------------

_Sharpe's Mission and Sharpe' s Revenge_

Wellington marches on steadily to Paris and with each mile the French grow more desperate. Major Ducos tries every underhanded trick in the book and it seems like Wellington is stumbling on traitors left right and centre, as Ducos bribes any susceptible English officer with dazzling promises from the french treasury. In the end though France loses and the underhanded sneak makes off with the treasury himself but alas not before implicating Richard himself with the theft. Richard however finds out again he has some invaluable friends and after an almost desperate flight over of what feels like half of a still hostile France he finds someone who can testify for his innocence. That person is Lucille Castineau and Richard has a hard time not falling in love with her even after she shot him with a blunderbuss. He remembers the promise he made himself. His heart is not entirely his own anymore. Antonia claimed a large part of it and any woman who wants piece of it will have to accomodate his daughter as well. But all hope is lost when he sees her reaction to the picture of Antonia he has taken to carry around. Richard doesn’ t have the money for a formal portrait but Major Hogan who as an ingeneer had some talent with a pencil had once made sketch of Antonia that he had livened up with some watercolor. He had managed to capture her wild curls and the gleam of mischief in her green eyes almost to perfection.  
Lucille exclaims: “ Mais quelle adorable gamine!” And with those words she steals whatever is left of Richard’ s heart.

\----------------------------------------------------------------

_Sharpe's Waterloo_

  
The peace does not last. Napoleon is a stubborn bugger and in 1815 RIchards finds himself being called away from the Chateau for one last campaign. Antonia is furious to see him leave having gotten quite used to having her daddy around on a more permanent base and his parting with Lucille is bittersweet as well. She has seen too many of her men not coming back and she fears he will not as well. It does not help that she is pregnant as she whispers to Richard just after he had climbed on his horse. Richard spends the whole campaign in turns elated and terrified and after things finally come to a head at place called Waterloo he is more than willing to wave his military carreer a final goodbye.

Patrick-Henri is born a few months after Waterloo and after witnessing the whole process Richard is unsure whether he is glad or sad he missed Antonia’s birth. Antonia herself had spend most of Lucille’s pregnancy almost resenting the coming of her new sibling, unwilling as she had been to share her father’s and step-mother’ s attention. Her opinion makes a complete face turn when she finally does meet her little brother. She spends an hour observing every little twitch he makes before marching to her father and asking him to teach her to shoot.  
RIchard chuckles and asks her why.  
‘ Because he is so small, and he needs someone else to look over him when you can’t be there.’  
Richards lets out a rueful laughs and promises her that yes when her arms are strong enough he will teach her to shoot.


End file.
